"Certainly, if you take a groom along," said I, recalling what little I knew on this particular point of etiquette. I had never indulged in equestrian sports in my own youth, nor had Euphemia, and so my authoritative tone was derived from surmises I had made from pictures I had seen on the subject--pictures, it must be confessed, in an English magazine, where a groom in pen and ink always figured in the sketches of Rotten Row. Yet when Peaches had departed sniffing at her bouquet, to write him a note, because, as she averred, the telephone service was so bad--much worse than the Los Angeles system--I wondered vaguely if she had not been making game of me in asking my permission and advice. Ordinarily I should have been certain that she was, but this time there was a genuine anxiety on her part to do the correct thing--a faint doubting of her own omnipotence which was new and wholly delightful. I yearned over her with an unuttered blessing, and returned to work upon my, or that is to say, Mr. Pegg's sock. How delightful the world seemed! And, of course, his being a Winton made such a difference! Of Peaches on horseback I have little to say besides the fact that she and the duke required the two tallest horses in the regiment. Words fail me when I attempt to describe how she looked, for there she was in her element. By some mysterious process she had acquired a hat belonging to one of the officers--a strange hat indeed for a man to have worn at any time, for it was covered with cock's plumes. And Peaches wore it with an air of nonchalance difficult to describe. But it certainly did look very like the pictures to which I have referred as my authority on the subject of horseback riding. There was no groom with them, but Mr. Pegg had decided to go along, so that was all right. I saw them start and then decided to have the yellow brocade which I had purchased in Paris made up for the wedding. As things were, I was not altogether surprised to find the Duke di Monteventi at Abby's house on the first occasion of our going there for dinner. I was glad it was so magnificent an entertainment with music, because when those two young people met in the beautiful hallway there should have been music and flowers, and there were! I have positively never seen anything so handsome as the duke in evening dress, except Peaches in that simple Nile-green satin gown! They came together like--like two branches of a stream--at once playfully antagonistic and blending! Yet their language was curiously unromantic. "Cheero!" said the duke. "You look ripping!" "You're not so dusty yourself," rejoined Peaches. And then Abby bore down upon us; Abby in a perfectly outrageous black evening gown with diamonds as big as pigeons' eggs in her ears, and very little else. She sailed up like a small sloop, all trig and confident, and after pecking me on the cheek extended a flower-like hand to Mr. Pegg.